analyzing agile project success criteria from a...
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Examensarbete Master's program in Industrial Management
Analyzing Agile Project Success Criteriafrom a Practitioner Perspective
Industrial Management, 15 credits
2020.02.21
Balajikarthik Kothuru Chinnadurai
Balajikarthik K.C. Thesis in Industrial Management (IN8017)
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ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
I would like to thank all the people who have supported and encouraged me during the process of
writing this thesis.
I’m grateful for the time and effort that the employees of HMS have given me. Their sharing of
knowledge, experiences within the field and their willingness to share their thought and willingness
with me has been central for conducting this thesis and inspired me to engage in this thesis further.
I’m also grateful to my academic supervisor Christer Norr and my examiner Deycy Sanchez who
provided me with constant support, encouragement, and advices. They believed in me and helped
me to stay focused throughout the thesis writing process.
I would like to thank my class mates and opponents, who contributed their time and effort to review
my work and to come up with constructive feedback all the time.
Finally, I would like to acknowledge my family who tried to provide the best possible educational
opportunity and their constant support through my academic years. And my wife who encouraged
me to get into a master’s program and has supported me with unconditional love and confidence.
Without these wonderful people this couldn’t have managed to complete my dissertation. A big
THANK YOU to all.
Balajikarthik Kothuru Chinnadurai
May 2019
Halmstad University
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ABSTRACT
Problem: Researchers argue that the definition of project success is difficult to pinpoint as it varies
depending on both individual perspectives and situational factors such as the organization and the
project type. They also argue that the traditional way of evaluating project success, by adhering to
schedule, cost, and scope, is outdated and incomplete and hence there still exists no exact definition
for agile project success.
Purpose: This thesis aims to create a definition of agile project success from the agile practitioner
perspective, as well as determining the success criteria they consider important. The empirical
findings and the models will help to define and evaluate agile project success they consider
important, and therefore partially fill the theoretical knowledge gap found.
Research methodology: Through critical literature review, the important theories were selected
and reviewed from which the analytical framework was formed. This analytical framework acts as
a basis for further discussions and analysis within this study. To collect data for this study an
interview study was performed with Swedish agile practitioners in a technology industry. Then the
interview data was transcribed and analyzed to find answers for the research question
Results: Thus, the most important access criterion considered by agile practitioners especially in
an IoT technology industry are found to be: Value, Team success, Quality, Business Benefits and
Constraints. Value was found to be the most important agile project success criteria and it
constitutes the backbone of APM. Team success is another vital criterion emerged within this
research. It is not an entirely new concept, but it has been given less importance in the previous
project management research.
Conclusion: Within this thesis it was found that a successful agile project is a project that generates
value in a sustainable manner. “A sustainable manner” also takes into consideration team success,
as well as the flexibility needed within an agile mind-set. Generating value both entails working
with quality, an important aspect of APM, as well as creating benefit for the customer. The agile
project success criteria found to be important by Swedish agile practitioners are: Value, Team
Success, Quality, Business Benefits, and Constraints.
Keywords: Agile Project Management, Agile Project Success Definition, Agile Project Success
Criteria, Agile Triangle
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LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS
TPM Traditional Project Management
APM Agile Project Management
IoT Internet of Things
PMBOK Project Management Book Of Knowledge
RUP Rational Unified Process
XP eXtreme Programming
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Table of Contents 1. INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................................ 6
1.1 Problem Background .......................................................................................................... 6
1.2 Purpose .............................................................................................................................. 7
1.3 Research Question .............................................................................................................. 7
1.4 Motivation ......................................................................................................................... 7
2. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK............................................................................................ 7
2.1 Project Management ........................................................................................................... 8
2.2 Project Management Methodologies ................................................................................... 8
2.2.1 Traditional Project Management .................................................................................. 8
2.2.2 Agile Project Management ......................................................................................... 10
2.3 Agile vs Stage gate ........................................................................................................... 17
2.4 Blending Agile and Stage-Gate ........................................................................................ 17
2.5 Scrum and Stage-Gate: Applying Hybrid Development Processes to Physical Products .... 17
2.6 Project Success................................................................................................................. 18
2.7 Project Success Criteria .................................................................................................... 18
2.7.1 Traditional approach to the Iron triangle .................................................................... 19
2.7.2 An Agile approach to Iron triangle ............................................................................. 20
2.8 Research Framework ........................................................................................................ 21
3. RESEARCH METHOD......................................................................................................... 22
3.1 Research design ............................................................................................................... 24
3.2 Research approach ........................................................................................................... 25
3.3 Research strategy ............................................................................................................. 26
3.4 Research method choice ................................................................................................... 26
3.5 Time horizons .................................................................................................................. 27
3.6 Data Collection Techniques .............................................................................................. 27
3.6.1 Primary data .............................................................................................................. 27
3.6.2 Secondary data........................................................................................................... 28
3.7 Sampling method ............................................................................................................. 28
3.8 Access to respondents ...................................................................................................... 28
3.9 Empirical Data ................................................................................................................. 28
3.10 Questionnaire Design ..................................................................................................... 29
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4. QUALITY OF THE REPORT ............................................................................................... 31
4.1 Reliability ........................................................................................................................ 31
4.2 Validity ............................................................................................................................ 31
5. FINDINGS ............................................................................................................................ 31
Interview 1 ............................................................................................................................. 31
Interview 2 ............................................................................................................................. 32
Interview 3 ............................................................................................................................. 33
Interview 4 ............................................................................................................................. 35
6. ANALYSIS and DISCUSSION ............................................................................................. 37
6.1 Project success criteria ..................................................................................................... 39
6.2 Conceptual Agile Project Success Criteria Model ............................................................. 42
7. CONCLUSION ..................................................................................................................... 44
7.1 Limitations ....................................................................................................................... 44
7.2 Implications for future research ........................................................................................ 45
APPENDIX ............................................................................................................................... 46
REFERENCES .......................................................................................................................... 49
List of Figures
Figure 1Traditional project management life cycle (Wysocki, 2014) ........................................................................ 9 Figure 2 Waterfall method (Basil, 2012).................................................................................................................. 9 Figure 3 The agile project life cycle (Wysocki, 2014) ..............................................................................................10 Figure 4 Scrum process (Cprime.com, 2018) ..........................................................................................................13 Figure 5 Traditional Iron triangle (Atkinson, 1999) ................................................................................................19 Figure 6 The Agile triangle (Highsmith, 2010) .......................................................................................................20 Figure 7 Research framework for this thesis ...........................................................................................................22 Figure 8 Research Onion model (Saunders et al., 2007) .........................................................................................23 Figure 9 Time frame of this research ......................................................................................................................23 Figure 10 Research design of this study..................................................................................................................24 Figure 11 Research method choice (Saunders et al., 2009) .....................................................................................26 Figure 12 Conceptual Agile Project Success Criteria Model ...................................................................................43
List of Tables
Table 1 Components of scrum (Sutherland and Schwaber, 2007) ............................................................................12 Table 2 Interview details ........................................................................................................................................29
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1. INTRODUCTION
Today, many organizations have started to implement project-based activities, since projects aid
organizations to deal with unique and complicated assignments, as well as to achieve strategic and
operational goals (Comella-dorda, Lohiya, & Speksnijder, 2016). At present there exists two
extensive project management methodologies. They are the Traditional Project Management and
Agile Project Management. Agile methods trademark change, adaptability, and flexibility, and are
today used across industries and business, as the characteristics of the methodology make it suitable
in today’s dynamic business environment. Even though projects are increasingly being used, it is
inconsistent with the remarkably low project success rates found. It has been found that only 30
per cent of projects are successful within the technology field. Consequently, this stress the need
to understand the inconsistencies found as well as generating suggestions for how to improve them.
It is arguable that the inconsistencies may be caused by the difficulty to define project success.
Researchers argue that the definition of project success is difficult to pinpoint as it varies depending
on both individual perspectives and situational factors such as the organization and the project type
(Besteiro, de Souza Pinto, & Novaski, 2015). It is also questionable whether or not appropriate
methods have been used to evaluate the success of a project, and that the use of inappropriate
methods may have contributed to the low success rates. Researchers argue that the traditional way
of evaluating project success, by adhering to schedule, cost, and scope, is outdated and incomplete,
and some have therefore developed new models that they consider more accurate for evaluating
project success. One of these researchers is Highsmith, one of the founders of the Agile Manifesto
(Highsmith, 2010) . He developed the Agile Triangle to better correspond to the agile trademarks
of change, adaptability, and flexibility when evaluating success on agile projects. Sometimes the
project can be finished within time, budget, and scope, but the client remains unsatisfied or
sometimes the project may exceed the budget and time, but the customer remains satisfied with the
product and considers it to be a successful one. Thus, there exists a change regarding how an agile
project success is perceived by different stakeholders within the project. But there is lack of
information about how the success of an agile project is measured in practice and how it can be
defined in a more theoretical way. So, this study is aimed to contribute with new insights into
theoretical and practical aspects of agile project success by studying agile project success from the
perspective of agile practitioners.
1.1 Problem Background
There are two comprehensive Project Management methodologies, providing tools and methods
for how to work with projects, those being Traditional Project Management (TPM) and Agile
Project Management (APM) (Fernandez & Fernandez, 2008). TPM entails extensive planning
efforts during the initial phase of a project, where the project scope is clearly defined, project task
duration estimated and positioned on a timeline, and the budget carefully considered (Nicholls,
Lewis, & Eschenbach, 2015). Further, Nicholls et al. (2015) state that TPM approaches assume
that a better project outcome is the result of better planning. On the contrary, APM methodologies
have a focus on processes, collaboration, and self-organization (Pope-Ruark, 2015). Chin (2004)
discusses APM processes as iterative where planning is less detailed and performed repeatedly.
The traditional view on project success focuses on the cost, schedule and scope of the project
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(Besteiro et al., 2015). The Iron Triangle has long been a tool used when measuring the success of
a project, by establishing whether the project was delivered within the constraints of schedule, cost
and scope (Jugdev & Müller, 2005). Nonetheless, an increasing amount of studies have found that
the Iron Triangle is not a sufficient method of establishing the success of a project (Atkinson, 1999).
1.2 Purpose
The purpose of this thesis is twofold. Firstly, this thesis aims to create a definition of agile project
success from a agile practitioner perspective, as well as determining the success criteria they
consider important. The empirical findings and the models will help to define and evaluate agile
project success they consider important, and therefore partially fill the theoretical knowledge gap
found. The knowledge gap found in the initial review of the literature considers both the
inconsistencies found in regards to project success as well as the practical use of the Agile Triangle.
From the literature review completed it was found that projects are increasingly popular, and
specifically APM has increased in popularity. It has however been found that the majority of
projects fail. Therefore, it is questionable if appropriate methods are used for determining project
success. This is something that will be further examined within this research. There are a variety
of definitions of project success, however no definitions specifically created for agile projects exist.
Within this research, agile project success will be discussed in depth with the research participants,
and a general definition of agile project success may be derived, partially filling the knowledge gap
presented.
1.3 Research Question
1. How do agile practitioners in the IoT industry perceive the success of an agile project?
2. What success criteria is considered important for an agile project to be successful in the IoT
field?
1.4 Motivation
The idea for the topic of this master thesis evolved from my interest in the field of agile project
management. I started my career as a deal operator in an e-Commerce company in India, which
was already practicing agile. Since it was the beginning of agile, as an employee I was not aware
of the agile principles and practices. Moreover it was not easy to transform from a traditional
waterfall method of working to agile way of working and this change resistance created a lot of
challenges for the company to completely adopt agile. But I had immense interest to learn about
agile methods and practices which motivated me to choose this topic for my master thesis research.
And as an international student in Sweden, I came to know that a lot of companies here are moving
towards the trend of adopting agile due to its flexible and adaptive nature. That’s the reason for
more projects becoming successful with the adoption of agile. So to understand the implementation
and adaptation of agile in real life environment, I began working on this interesting topic to gain
more knowledge and insight on this subject.
2. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
This section explains the different theories that are forms the basis for the discussion of relevant
aspects of the study. The section serves as a snippet to the traditional and agile project management
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methods and their application in the technology industry. The review of the literature leads to
identification of gap which is made explicit in the study. The structure of theoretical review is
presented below.
The concept of Project Management will first be defined. The two methodologies of Project
Management; that of TPM and APM will be presented. Project success will be elaborated on and
the difference between project success, project management success, and product success will be
explained. At the end of the Theoretical Frame of Reference a Research Framework will be
presented. This framework will incorporate all models presented and assist the rest of the research.
2.1 Project Management
PMI (Project Management Institute) defined the project management process as Project
Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK) in five main process groups (initiating, planning,
execution, controlling and closure) and drew project management knowledge into ten areas
(integration, scope, time, cost, quality, human resource, communication, risk management,
procurement management, stakeholder management). According to PMBOK the definition of
project is given as “a temporary activity within a group, which results in a unique product or
service” (Project Management Institute Inc, 2000, p. 6). According to Nerur et al (2005) projects
have certain characteristics: unique, uncertain, ambiguous, innovative. And these characteristics
make the companies to evolve according to changing requirements.
2.2 Project Management Methodologies
During the last decades companies are facing increased competitive pressures caused by markets
globalization and internationalization. The endeavor to solve this problem pushed companies to
engage in projects which became crucial for operations (Horwitz et al., 2002; Lodorfos & Boateng,
2006; Raymond & Bergeron, 2008). Thus, in order to ensure companies’ competitiveness and
success it becomes supreme to adequately manage projects and for that reason appeared project
management able to handle this novel or complex activities “which are inevitably called a project”
(Munns & Bjeirmi, 1996). Historically, the tools and techniques developed to execute Project
Management practices were only used in a limited number of industries such as aerospace, defense
and construction (Cicmil, 2000). Today, the use of Project Management practices has spread across
fields (Perminova, Gustafsson, & Wikström, 2008) and Project Management has become a subject
discipline on its own (Atkinson, 1999). This illustrates how Project Management practices have
become more established in businesses today. Within the discipline there are two methodologies
that are used, those being TPM methodologies and APM methodologies.
2.2.1 Traditional Project Management
Traditional project management is used for projects that needed more control over them (Hall,
2012). The managers in Traditional project management create schedules for projects with defined
scopes and times to finish each task with estimated resource availability (Nicholls et al., 2015).
The main assumption of traditional project management is that better planning results in better
project outcomes (Nicholls et al., 2015). TPM balances cost, schedule, and scope focusing mostly
on cost and schedule to deliver the defined scope (Nicholls et al., 2015). There are different
traditional approaches to project management like waterfall, Rational Unified Process, Spiral
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model, V-model. One of the most commonly used traditional project management method in
software development is the waterfall model (Ramel, 2010) which will be explained in detail
below.
Figure 1Traditional project management life cycle (Wysocki, 2014)
Waterfall Approach
Waterfall model was proposed in 1970 (Bassil, 2012). It is a sequential design process and
commonly used in software development. Waterfall development process is shown as if flowing
steadily downwards like a waterfall. It is the reason why it is called waterfall development
approach. According to Phatak (2018), this approach comprises five phases to be completed
sequentially in order to develop a software solution. The phases are analysis, design,
implementation, testing and maintenance, which is shown in Figure below. In this sequentially
structured approach, the development team goes ahead to the next stage of software development;
only after the previous stage is fully accomplished (Phatak, 2012).
Figure 2 Waterfall method (Basil, 2012)
Rational Unified Process
The Rational Unified Process (RUP) was developed by Rational Software Corporation in 2003.
This methodology is categorized as an iterative enhancement model that is adaptable to the
organization and project specific context. RUP lifecycle consists of four phases, which are
(Rational Unified Process, 1998):
Initiation Planning ExecutionMonitor &
ControlClosing
Aanalysis
Design
Implementation
Testing
Maintenance
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● Inception: determine the business case for the system and define the project scope
● Elaboration: analyze the problem domain, set up the architectural foundation, develop the project
plan and mitigate the key risk items.
● Construction: build the software components and features. Integrate them into the product and
test it thoroughly.
● Transition: deploy the system to the end user. Handle all issues by correcting problems,
developing new releases, and finishing postponed features. Each phase can be broken down into
several iterations which resulted in a release of an executable product. The produced system will
grow incrementally from iteration to iteration and finally will become the final system. There are
six core process workflows, namely: business modeling, requirements, analysis and design,
implementation, test, and deployment. In addition, there are three core supporting workflows,
namely: configuration and change management, project management, and environment (Rational,
1998).
2.2.2 Agile Project Management
The software development is constantly introducing new approaches and methods, from which
only few have survived and are used today (Abrahamsson, Salo, Ronkainen, & Warsta, 2002). One
of those is the agile approach. In 2001, APM principles were established by 17 software developers
in order to overcome managerial difficulties encountered when using TPM approaches in software
development (Highsmith, 2001). APM projects are change driven. This means that instead of
avoiding changes in the project, changes are encouraged. This causes a more dynamic relationship
between the team that creates the product, and the external stakeholders (anyone with a vested
interest in the product) which requested it. Stakeholders are more involved in the process, but the
end result will be much closer to what they really wanted. Since the end solution (scope) is unclear
at the beginning, it is defined throughout the project, based on feedback from the customer and
other stakeholders.
Iteration 1, 2,…..,N
Figure 3 The agile project life cycle (Wysocki, 2014)
Initiation Planning
Execution
Closing
Monitor &
control Closure
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Agile software development is a group of software development methodologies based on iterative
and incremental process in which requirements and solutions evolve through collaboration between
self-organizing, cross-functional teams (Beck et al., 2001). The start of Agile is often seen as a
response to the disadvantages of traditional methods of product development such as inflexibility
and failure to address the new changes and requests of the customer. APM also defined the adaptive
model, which is very similar to the iterative model, but it has an even shorter loop time, making it
easier to respond to changing requirements. The main difference between the adaptive and the
iterative model is that more of the solution is unknown in the adaptive model. The less that is
known, the more risk and complexity there will be. When complexity is high, an adaptive model
is more favorable (Wysocki, 2014).
The transition from traditional project management to agile is not easy and there are a lot of
prerequisites needed to enable smooth transition. But there are also challenges during this transition
process. A case study on Cisco systems shows that companies face two broad challenges when
transitioning to the agile product development model. The first is identifying and helping business
units and engineering teams adopt this method; the second is developing new management
practices that are compatible with and can sustain the agile development practices. The study shows
that companies need to take a holistic, systematic approach to handling the transition to the agile
development method. The study also sheds light on the challenges that the agile development
process poses for global operations (Chen, Ravichandar, & Proctor, 2015).
The Agile Manifesto
The common ground of Agile software development was defined in 2001. Seventeen expert
professionals agreed and signed the Agile software development manifesto, which is as follows
(Beck et al., 2001):
“We are uncovering better ways of developing software by doing it and helping others does it.
Through this work we have come to value:
• Individuals and interactions over processes and tools
• Working software over comprehensive documentation
• Customer collaboration over contract negotiation
• Responding to change over following a plan
That is, while there is value in the items on the right, we value the items on the left more.”
Agile Project Management Methods
There are different agile approaches like scrum, lean, XP, Kanban, Feature Driven Development
(FDD). Two of the most popular agile methods: Scrum (Forrester, 2012) and XP (eXtreme
Programming) (Gassmann et al., 2006) will be addressed under this section.
Scrum
"Scrum is a framework within which people can address complex adaptive problems, while
productively and creatively delivering products of the highest possible value" (Schwaber &
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Sutherland, 2013). A key principle of scrum is its recognition that during a project the customers
can change their minds about what they want and need (often called "requirements churn"), and
that unpredicted challenges cannot be easily addressed in a traditional predictive or planned
manner. As such, scrum adopts an empirical approach—accepting that the problem cannot be fully
understood or defined, focusing instead on maximizing the team’s ability to deliver quickly and
respond to emerging requirements (Schwaber, 2002).
Components of scrum
Scrum Model consists of three main components Role, Process and Artifacts. Scrum master is the
role traditionally assumed by the team leader or facilitator who is responsible for enacting the
Scrum vales and practices and removing impediments. Scum master is not a project manager.
Scrum teams are cross functional team of five to ten full time working members. The leadership
role within the self-managing teams is not fixed and changes depending on the needs of the iteration
(known as sprint) in process of the time. The product owner is typically a functional unit manager
who know how, when and what needs to be built. The product owner has vision of the product and
responsible for profitability and delivery of the product (Sutherland & Schwaber, 2007).
3 ROLES 5 EVENTS 3 ARTIFACTS
Product owner Sprint Product backlog
Scrum master Sprint planning meeting Sprint backlog
Development team Daily scrum Product increment
Sprint review
Sprint retrospective
Table 1 Components of scrum (Sutherland and Schwaber, 2007)
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Figure 4 Scrum process (Cprime.com, 2018)
Scrum roles:
Product owner
According to (Schwaber, 2004; Sutherland & Schwaber, 2007) the responsibilities within the scrum
are divided among the product owner, scrum master and the scrum team.
The product owner collects all the interests of the stakeholders in the project and conveys it to the
scrum team. The product owner is responsible for the return on investment as well as creating
release plan. The list of requirements collected by the product owner comes under product backlog
(Diebold, Ostberg, Wagner, & Zendler, 2015). However, the product owner has the power to
change the features of the product and its priority during each sprint. The product owner is different
from the scrum master (Cohn, 2010). As the Product Owner is the sole person allowed to change
the Product Backlog, it is critical that the development team has access and possibilities to discuss
the Product Backlog with the Product Owner (Kniberg, 2015)
Scrum master
The scrum master is responsible for the success of the project by ensuring whether the team
members are productive and functional. The Scrum Master makes sure Scum is followed as
intended and understood outside the Scrum Team (Sutherland & Schwaber, 2011), and remove
impediments for the team (Dybå & Dingsøyr, 2008; Sutherland & Schwaber, 2011). The scrum
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Team develop the Increment; a set of Product Backlog items (Schwaber & Sutherland, 2011). He
interacts with the development team and the customer ensuring that team is working as
productively as possible (Abrahamsson et al., 2002).
Scrum team
The scrum team is a cross-functional and self-organizing team. They are responsible for developing
the product increment. They have the right to do everything within the project to complete the
project within time. The scrum Team itself consists of highly skilled employees who deliver an
Increment of the product at the end of each Sprint, where Sprints’ length is commonly held for 4
weeks (Cohen, Lindvall, & Costa, 2004). Scrum teams have the following characteristics: Self-
organizing, Cross-functional (i.e. team has all necessary skills to create a product Increment) and
Accountability that is on all Team members (Schwaber & Sutherland, 2011).
Characteristics of scrum
Schwaber (2002) summarizes the key principles of scrum as follows:
• Small working teams that maximize communication and tacit, informal knowledge sharing, and
minimize overhead.
• “Adaptability to technical or marketplace (user/customer) changes to ensure the best possible
product is produced.”
• Frequent “builds” that can be examined, adjusted, tested, documented, and built on. • Distribution
“of work and team assignments into clean, low coupling partitions, or packets”.
• “Constant testing and documentation of a product as it is built.”
Scrum events
The following are the scrum events described by authors Sutherland and Schwaber (2007). In the
kick off meeting the group defines the high-level backlog for the project and the major project
goals. It is slightly different form the sprint planning meeting. There are two types of backlog
instruments which are important in Scrum process i.e. product backlog and development sprint
backlog. Product backlog is central to Scrum method as it contains prioritized list of items relevant
to product and also consists of bugs, customer requests enhancements, competitive product
functionality, competitive edge functionality and technology upgrades (Deemer & Vodde, 2012).
The sprint planning meeting is a meeting of the Scrum team, the Scrum master, and the product
owner at the beginning of each sprint (iteration). These meetings, which may take up to a day,
consist of two parts. In the first part of the meeting, two major activities occur. First, the group
defines the product backlog, which is basically a list of project requirements. After this, the group
determines the sprint goal, which is the formal outcome from this particular sprint. In the second
part of the meeting, the focus of work is on creating the sprint backlog (Benefield, Larman, &
Vodde, 2010).
The Sprint can begin after sprint planning meeting. Sprint is limited to a month-long iteration cycle
in which functionality of the product is further developed and no outside interference is allowed
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with the work of the Scrum team which means product requirement cannot be changed during the
sprint (Larman et al., n.d.). The Scrum meeting takes place every day between the Scrum master
and the Scrum team and usually lasts for 15 minutes. Every team member answers briefly about
their last Scrum and what they will be doing next and what are the problems. The daily Scrum is
not a problem solving session is and only held to collect information about the work schedule and
progress.
The sprint review meeting is held after each sprint where the functionality of the sprint is
demonstrated to the product owners. This meeting is usually information and is not a distraction
for the team members (Benefield et al., 2010).
Scrum artifacts
Scrum Artifacts is the last major component that includes the product backlog, the sprint backlog,
and burn down chart. Product backlog is the prioritized list of requirements for the project and is
managed and owned by the product owner. The product backlog is a major deliverable of the
kickoff or sprint planning meetings (Benefield et al., 2010). The Sprint backlog is the subset of
product backlog. Unlike the project backlog the sprint backlog is created by the Scrum team
members. It is updated every day and contains not more than 300 tasks and the team can breakdown
the tasks if it is more than 16 hours of work. Scrum intentionally focuses on working through the
use of burn-down charts. Burn down charts provides information easily and in comprehensive
manner. Three types of burn down charts are commonly used; sprint burn down chart documents
the progress of the sprint, the release burn down chart documenting the progress of the releases and
the product burn down chart documenting the overall project progress (Sutherland and Schwaber,
2007). The final artifact of scrum is the actual product increment as it exists at the end of a sprint,
with all of the stories in that sprint which met the definition of done incorporated. At the end of
each sprint, the completed features that were worked on should be added to the product for the
sprint demo. At that point, the product itself is an artifact of the scrum process (Deemer & Vodde,
2012).
Extreme programming
Extreme Programming or XP is one of initial Agile approaches that has been proposed after the
problem of long development cycle of traditional development models. The idea is developed by
Kent Beck and Ward Cunningham in the late 1990s. The starting point of the XP is doing the
simplest things to get the job done. It uses the practices that have been proved to be effective in
software development. XP aims to address the specific needs of software development performed
by small teams facing vague and changing requirements, which are hard to handle by conventional
software development. After several trials and adjustments of practices, XP was proposed as a
discipline to help people develop high quality software by following key values and practices. The
four values are communication, simplicity, feedback and courage. These values are realized
through a set of individual 12 practices taken from the Beck’s book as following (Beck, 1999):
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1. Planning game: Planning the next releases features is performed by having developers
estimate the effort needed for the customer stories implementation. Then the customers
decide about the scope and release time. This emphasizes the close interaction between
customers and developers.
2. Small releases: Release the software often to the customer with small incremental versions.
New version of products is released at least monthly or can be even daily.
3. Metaphor: The metaphor is a simple story shared between customers and developers of how
the system works.
4. Simple design: Design the simplest solution that is workable at that time and constantly
evolves to add needed flexibility. Useless complexity and unessential code should be
removed.
5. Testing: Test driven development is the key which means the developers write unit tests
before the production code. The unit tests must run perfectly for development to continue
and be kept running at all times. Customers write the functional tests to test the stories.
6. Refactoring: Restructure the system without changing its behavior by removing duplication
complexity from code, improving communication, simplifying, and adding flexibility.
7. Pair programming: Two programmers write all production code together at a single
computer. One writes the code and, at the same time, another reviews the code for
correctness and understandability.
8. Collective ownership: Every developer owns the code. Therefore, they can change any part
code in the system at any time.
9. Continuous integration: Build and integrate the system several times a day whenever the
task is completed.
10. 40-hour week: Work no more than 40 hours a week as a rule. Never work overtime for two
consecutive weeks.
11. On-site customer: Include a real customer that can work with the development team and is
available full-time to help defines the system and answers questions.
12. Coding standards: Developers write all codes in accordance with rules.
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2.3 Agile vs Stage gate
Boehm and Turner (2004) aptly summarize the differences between plan-driven software
development (based on gated or waterfall models) and Agile approaches: gate models, they explain,
are generally “plan-driven models,” whereas Agile is more “plan and build on the fly.”
Stage-Gate Agile
Type Macroplanning Microplanning, project management
Scope Idea to launch Development and testing, can be
expanded to pre-development
Organization Cross-functional team (R&D,
marketing, sales, operations)
Technical team (software developers,
engineers)
Decision-model Investment model-go/kill
decisions involve a senior
governance group
Tactical model-decisions about actions
for next sprint made largely by self-
managed team
Table 2:Characteristics of Stage-Gate vs Agile
2.4 Blending Agile and Stage-Gate
(Karlstrom and Runeson, 2005, 2006) studied three large, European high-technology firms where
Stage-Gate and Agile were integrated for IT projects. three firms that took part in this Swedish
study-Ericsson, ABB, and Vodafone-all already had Stage-Gate systems; they simply built Agile
methods (the XP version) into their existing processes from the development-approval gate
onward. The researchers found first, that the integration did work-the two models were indeed
compatible-and second, that this hybrid approach yielded several major payoffs: Better internal
team communication, More efficient planning, Improved customer feedback, Clearer resolution of
documentation issues, Improved attitudes.
Overall, the researchers conclude, “Agile methods give the stage-gate model powerful tools for
microplanning, day-to-day work control, and progress reporting” (Karlstrom and Runeson 2005,
49). The daily face-to-face meetings called for by Agile methods provide more powerful
communications than written documents, and the fast and continuous feedback from customers on
product features make for a better product and a more efficient project. Conversely, they note that
“software development projects are not isolated activities. They usually exist as sub-projects in an
environment composed of hardware development, marketing, production planning etc., which all
must be managed and coordinated concurrently . . . [Stage-Gate] gives support not only for the
communication within the project, but also for decision-makers sponsoring the project or acquiring
the outcome of the project” (Karlstrom and Runeson 2006, 204). Thus, Agile offers greater
efficiency and focus, and Stage-Gate provides a means to coordinate with other development teams
and communicate with functions such as marketing and senior management.
2.5 Scrum and Stage-Gate: Applying Hybrid Development Processes to Physical Products
Recently, Agile has begun to attract serious interest from developers of physical products (Cooper,
2014; Ovesen & Sommer, 2015). In manufacturing firms, Agile was first adopted by IT
departments or by R&D groups in which software development was a key part of hardware
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projects. The results of these initial projects encouraged R&D groups working on hardware
development to experiment with Agile, and to modify the method to fit their needs (Sommer et al.
2015). The hybrid model balances the benefits and challenges of the two different approaches.
2.6 Project Success
Project success is often discussed; still misunderstandings often arise in regards to its definition
(Cicmil, 2000). Previous research on project success present different approaches concerning how
to define and assess project success criteria (Cicmil, 2000). Historically, project success was
defined in terms of keeping within the predetermined scope, schedule, and cost, which are the three
dimensions of the Iron Triangle (Kloppenborg, Tesch, & Manolis, 2014). Kerzner (2013) has
extended this definition by adding four more criteria: customer acceptance, minimal scope changes,
and without either disturbing the workflow nor changing the culture of the organization.
Westerveld (2003) refers to project success in terms of satisfying all project stakeholders. However,
not all researchers believe that defining project success is as straightforward as earlier believed.
Some researchers argue that project success depends on personal perceptions of the stakeholder
and that this leads to disagreements in regards to defining it (Karlsen, Andersen, Birkely, &
Ødegard, 2005; Lim & Mohamed, 1999). Further, it has been suggested that success depends on
contextual factors (Jugdev & Müller, 2005) and that project success criteria vary among individual
projects (Müller & Turner, 2007). In one of their more recent studies, Müller and Jugdev (2012)
discuss how the perception and dimensions of success vary depending on factors such as project
type, contract type, personality, and nationality. In regards to the definition of project success,
differentiating views are important to discuss. Researchers argue that there are different measures
to be used depending on whether one would like to measure project success or project management
success (Baccarini, 1999; Cooke-Davies, 2002).
2.7 Project Success Criteria
When researching success, one comes across both success criteria and success factors. Within this
thesis it is important to define success criteria and to make the distinction between success criteria
and success factors. Lim and Mohamed (1999) define criteria as the standards that aid when a
decision is made and Cooke-Davies (2002) defines success criteria as “the measures by which
success or failure of a project or business will be judged”. Factors, on the other hand, are events,
facts, or influences that add to the results (Lim & Mohamed, 1999). Moreover, Cooke-Davies
(2002) describes success factors as the elements that contribute to project or business success.
Referring back to the purpose of this study, this distinction is important since the study aims to
determine success criteria preferred.
Project success criteria can be divided into two categories; soft project success criteria and hard
project success criteria (Baccarini, 1999; Munns & Bjeirmi, 1996). Hard project success criteria
refer to quantitative and tangible criteria (Baccarini, 1999). Both cost and schedule are hard criteria
as they are easily measured (Munns & Bjeirmi, 1996). Soft project success criteria, on the other
hand, are 15 defined as subjective and not easily measured (Baccarini, 1999). Munns and Bjeirmi
(1996) loosely name the soft criteria people skills, whereas Baccarini (1999) discuss job
satisfaction and happiness as soft criteria.
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2.7.1 Traditional approach to the Iron triangle
The Iron Triangle is expressed in terms of scope, schedule, and cost (Atkinson, 1999; Ika, 2009;
Maylor, 2010). Scope is in some research defined as quality (Maylor, 2010). Schedule and cost are
dimensions that are easy to comprehend, however scope may be more difficult. Scope relates to
the predetermined requirements in terms of performance and technology (Kerzner, 2013), whereas
schedule refers to the scheduling and completion dates of tasks, and cost refers to the budget of the
project (Drury-Grogan, 2014). It has been found that project managers consider scope to be the
most important component of the Iron Triangle, followed by schedule, and finally cost (White &
Fortune, 2002). Furthermore, research shows that the three dimensions of the Iron Triangle are
interlinked, and that a change in one will lead to a change in at least one of the other dimensions
(Nicholls et al., 2015; Maylor, 2010).
As discussed previously, the dimensions of the Iron Triangle are directly related to project
management success, no matter the definition one chooses to follow. Both cost and schedule are
considered hard success criteria, whereas scope is more difficult to pinpoint as either a hard success
criterion or a soft success criterion. Scope can be considered a hard success criterion if
communication is done properly and details are quantifiable. The dimensions of the Iron Triangle
were first described in 1969 (Weaver, 2007).
Scope
(Functionality)
Resources Schedule
(cost) (Time)
Figure 5 Traditional Iron triangle (Atkinson, 1999)
The Iron Triangle has aided project managers to track and monitor their projects through this
framework consisting of its competing requirements (Drury-Grogan, 2014). Using the Iron
Triangle as a success criterion has since long been established (Atkinson, 1999). Today, researchers
agree that the traditional view of establishing project success is based in the three corners of the
triangle (Drury-Grogan, 2014; Ika, 2009; Serrador & Pinto, 2015). Drury-Grogan (2014) discusses
how it is not a coincidence that the Iron Triangle is used to determine project success, since
companies use project management practices to deliver the good of a project within its prespecified
cost, schedule, and scope. This is strengthened by Maylor (2010), who argues that a project’s
Quality
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objectives simplistically can be considered in terms of scope, schedule, and cost. Further, Maylor
(2010) discusses how organizations should conform to these objectives, resulting in the importance
of the Iron Triangle for measuring project success. The Critical Chain, previously mentioned within
Theory of Constraints, was developed as existing methods used to suffer from chronic problems,
such as delays, overspending, and a failure to deliver desired specifications (Rand, 2000). These
problems are directly related to the dimensions of the Iron Triangle and illustrate the importance
of these dimensions as success criteria.
2.7.2 An Agile approach to Iron triangle
In 2009, Highsmith introduced the Agile Triangle to better measure performance, and thus establish
the success of an agile project (Highsmith, 2009). Highsmith (2009) argues that establishing
success of an agile project through the Traditional Iron Triangle will give dysfunctional results,
which is why agile 21 organizations and teams need a new triangle; the Agile Triangle. The Agile
Triangle illustrates a new point of view regarding the limitations of a project). Similar to the
Traditional Iron Triangle, the Agile Triangle has three dimensions, those being value, quality, and
constraints. The dimensions of the Traditional Iron Triangle - scope, schedule, and cost are
represented within constraints (Highsmith, 2009). Highsmith (2009) clarifies that the constraints
are still important to the project, but that they do not compromise the goals of the project. The goal
that is more important to focus on is value (Highsmith, 2009). By having a fixed focus on value,
constraints have the chance to change throughout the project process, resulting in maximised value
(Highsmith, 2009). Further, Highsmith (2009) argues that schedule may be fixed, but that this
would mean that scope could be adjusted to deliver the highest possible value within that time
frame, indicating a more flexible relationship between the different constraints, scope, cost, and
schedule, throughout the project.
Value
Quality Constraints
Figure 6 The Agile triangle (Highsmith, 2010)
The dimensions established by Highsmith (2009) are seen in Figure 6 given above: Value, Quality,
and Constraints. Each dimension of the Agile Triangle is created with a particular goal in mind.
The goal of the Value dimension is to build a releasable product, the goal of the Quality dimension
is to build a reliable and adaptable product, and the goal of the Constraints dimension is to achieve
the Value and Quality goals within acceptable Constraints (Highsmith, 2009).
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The first dimension is Value. Highsmith (2009) explains that customer quality, being extrinsic
quality, creates value short-term. Highsmith (2010) further explains the value dimension on his
website, arguing that scope is a poor control mechanism for projects. He argues that value is a
better control mechanism as software systems often involve unused functions (Highsmith, 2010).
Sometimes the entire scope does not have to be met for the product to be deemed releasable, and
the functional needs met (Highsmith, 2010). Value is considered to consist of soft project success
criteria as it is subtle and difficult to quantify, and is also considered under the category of product
success as it falls within project purpose.
The second dimension is Quality. In comparison to Value, the Quality dimension of the Agile
Triangle represents intrinsic quality. Highsmith (2009) elaborates on what he perceives as intrinsic
quality, explaining that it is technical quality, which creates value in the long run. Technical quality
illustrates the future quality of the product, and establishes the ability to react to both foreseeable
and unforeseeable events (Highsmith, 2010).
The third and final dimension, Constraints, constitutes the three dimensions found in the Iron
Triangle. Highsmith (2010) argues that these factors are important, but do not represent the goals
of the project. Scope, schedule, and cost aid in establishing clear rules that the project team must
follow, and are critical in terms of delivery (Highsmith, 2010). However, Highsmith (2010)
explains that only one of the factors can be dominant, clarifying that within agile projects this is
usually schedule.
2.8 Research Framework
From the above literatures an analytical research framework is developed including the project
success criteria. The framework will be helpful for evaluating project success and it aid the rest of
the research. the framework is based on 3 dimensions of the agile triangle which are useful for
evaluating the success of agile project.
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Figure 7 Research framework for this thesis
The research framework is formed from the two models iron triangle and agile triangle which are
used for evaluating the success of a project. These models provide a foundation for determining
the success of a project by complementing and strengthening each other. This framework was
formed by finding similarities between the two models and thereby will support the research
question and purpose of this study. The first dimension in the framework is called constraints which
covers cost, schedule, and scope of a project. They are the dimensions based on which a success of
a project is evaluated. These constraints are covered in both agile and the iron triangle. When a
project is measured against this dimension short-term success in terms of efficiency can be
achieved. Including this dimension will help the author to evaluate the data between the models
used. The second dimension is called value which is a new dimension compared to the iron triangle.
Here value refers to stakeholder satisfaction which is more important in agile projects. by
measuring a project against this dimension short term success in terms of stakeholder satisfaction
can be achieved. The last dimension of the research framework is called quality which is derived
from the agile triangle. In agile projects the quality is more important for its longevity. Thereby
measuring a project against this dimension provides a long-term success in terms of project
longevity.
3. RESEARCH METHOD
For this study the research design is formulated from the ‘Research Onion’ model of Saunders et
al., (2007). The various elements present in the model are applicable to this study and are explained
Constraints
cost, schedule and scope
Covered ithin:
Agile triangle
Iron triangle
short-term success
Value
stakeholder
satisfaction
Covered within:
Agile triangle
short-term success
Quality
maintainability,
reliability and validity of the product
Covered within:
Agile triangle
long-term success
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in detail below. An introduction about each element are given and then the justification behind
using appropriate method is described in detail.
Figure 8 Research Onion model (Saunders et al., 2007)
During the initial months all the important concepts related to project management were studied.
Literatures related to agile project management were collected and studied to understand the
current trends and the knowledge gap existing in this field. This will help the author to formulate
the research question in order to find the answers for the existing gap in the literature. After
reviewing the literatures in a systematic way, the author came with a problem area in agile project
management and formulated the research question which is to understand how the agile
practitioners in the technology industry especially in IoT field perceive the success of agile projects
and the success criteria that is considered important according to them.
Figure 9 Time frame of this research
The next step was to formulate suitable research design for the type of research question posed.
Here the main aim is to understand the perception of agile practitioners about the agile project
success and the success criteria that is considered important according to them. Hence an overall
strategy has to chosen to integrate all the different components of the study in a coherent and logical
way. Then the primary data was collected through face-to-face interviews with agile practitioners
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having different job roles within the organization. After collecting enough data, the non-verbal data
was analyzed by drawing out patterns from concepts and insights. For the purpose of getting
qualitative in-depth data purposive heterogenous sampling was done to capture wider range of
views about the research problem. After analyzing the data, the results are presented during the
seminar.
3.1 Research design
Figure 10 Research design of this study
The above figure 10 shows the process of research design which was formulated in a way beginning
with an initial literature review to understand the important concepts within agile project
management. Then the research gap was spotted by identifying an area that lacked empirical
support or proof. From this study it was found that there is lack of proper definition and knowledge
about agile project success. Then the research question was formulated in order to find an answer
for the research gap. Again, through critical literature review, the important theories were selected
and reviewed from which the analytical framework was formed. This analytical framework acts as
a basis for further discussions and analysis within this study. To collect data for this study an
interview study was performed with Swedish agile practitioners in a technology industry. Then the
interview data was transcribed and analyzed to find answers for the research question. Based on
the answers of interviewees a conceptual model is created comparing the existing available
theoretical model and finally conclusions are made based on the model developed and the findings
from this study along with implications for future research.
Initial Literature review
Identification of research gap
Forming research questions
Critical literature review
Forming Analytical framework
Data collection (primary data)
Analysis and discussion
Formation of conceptual model
Theory building
conclusion
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Reviewing the literature
In this study, for the literature review we followed certain steps which help to generate a quality in
building the literature (Jain et al.,2010). The articles are downloaded using the general database
which is searched in internet by using keywords. The keywords used to find the relevant and useful
material during the search. Those database found in the internet by using the relevant keywords
which also helps to find the useful materials as they are “cornerstone of an effective search”
(Bolderston, 2008).
The key words used to search papers were: Agile Project Management, Agile Project Success
Definition, Agile Project Success Criteria, Agile Triangle.
The articles and journals were evaluated based on inclusion criteria like:
• Research article or journal topic closely related to the topic of the research question.
• Papers that deal with agile project management within software field and in general.
• Papers that answer directly the research question of this study, especially the ones that
provide direct evidence about the research question.
• The papers are evaluated based on certain criteria like selecting papers related to topic using
keywords which lead to the find right information relevant to the study.
• It is also evaluated by scanning the list of references listed down at end of the paper.
• There are some papers which are also evaluated and referred based on the recent research
information about the industries which got adapted to new technologies in supply chain.
• There is a scenario where some papers have only half-information which leads us to think
more in advance to search the next version of the paper in the databases using the same
author, publications, and topics. Whereas, searches can be restricted by other factors also
like different languages of publication, full text only, review papers and year of publications
so on.
The articles and journals were evaluated based on exclusion criteria like:
• Duplicate copy of the same research study.
• Articles that do not describe agile project success.
• Articles which were written in languages other than English.
• Articles published on websites of the companies.
• Chapter of book will not be studied, only articles are considered for review.
• Studies that are in progress research or incomplete results.
• Studies that mention agile project success in brief as part of another subject but not
focusing on it as an actual research issue.
3.2 Research approach
The author uses an Abductive approach for this study which includes a combination of both
inductive and deductive methods. Inductive approach aims to build theory with the help of data
from collected from interviews whereas, but also a deductive approach to test theories based on the
analytical framework used in this study (Saunders, Lewis, & Thornhill, 2009). This inductive
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research approach supports the research question which is to understand how project managers and
the agile team perceive the success of agile project and to find out the most important success
criteria according to them. An inductive approach is used to answer the research question as it is
associated with theory building. No theories related to agile project success has been presented in
the theoretical frame of reference since it offers no answer for the research question posed.
Moreover, this approach aided the author to collect necessary data to build the theories. Whereas
through the deductive approach the existing theory in agile project success is tested with the
interviewee data and based on the results a new theory is emerged through this study which makes
it more abductive. Less knowledge about agile success definition and agile success criteria has
been available in the existing literature. So, purpose of the study is to fill this literature gap.
3.3 Research strategy
Since the research uses ‘how’ type question, an interview study will be a suitable strategy (Yin,
2009). The main reason behind opting the interview study as a research strategy is to get detailed
information about the research question. This type of primary data collection will help the author
to have a direct control over the process and provides a chance to clarify certain issues related to
agile project success.
3.4 Research method choice
The purpose of the research question is to understand the different perspectives of the concept of
success in Agile project management that are not possible to describe in a general way for all the
practitioners in the same sector, and hence a qualitative research method is best suited for ‘how’
type of research question posed (Sachdeva, 2009). In order to fulfill the purpose of the research
question a rich descriptive and detailed data is needed (Wahyuni, 2010). This strengthens the choice
of a qualitative research method for this study.
Research choices
Mono method Multiple methods
Qualitative method
Figure 11 Research method choice (Saunders et al., 2009)
According to Saunders et al. (2009) an exploratory research can be conducted by performing a
literature review, by interviewing experts within the field and by conducting focus group
interviews. The research choices are further divided into mono method and multiple methods. This
study uses mono method since the data collected through interviews will be analyzed using
qualitative data analysis procedures.
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3.5 Time horizons
Since the research question aims to understand how agile practitioners perceive the agile project
success and what success criteria they consider important, a cross-sectional study is chosen due to
time constraints. The research is performed during 4 months’ time and the agile project success
phenomenon is studied only during this time limit and the results are also analyzed at a given point
in time, which makes it a cross-sectional study.
3.6 Data Collection Techniques
According to Yin, case study interviews are of 3 types. First type is the in-depth interview in which
the interviews are questions about facts and their opinion about the subject and takes place for a
longer period of time. The second type of case study interview is the focused interview. The last
type of case study interview is the survey interview which is mostly quantitative. For this research
a semi-structure face-to-face interview method is chosen as a primary data collection technique
(Yin, 2009).
3.6.1 Primary data
There are two types of data collection methods used for this case study. They are Primary data and
Secondary data. Primary data is the collection of new data, while the secondary data is collected
by someone else for a purpose other than that of study (Saunders et al., 2009). By using two
independent sources of data triangulation is done to cross-check whether the findings answer the
research question. For this thesis primary data was collected through semi-structured face-to-face
interviews and telephone interviews while the secondary data is documentary.
Semi-structured face-to-face interview
The semi-structured interview will help the author to have a deep dialogue with the interviewees
to understand the context from their point of view (Wahyuni, 2010). Semi-structured interviews
are non-standardized interviews as they may vary in terms of the number of questions asked as well
as their respective order (Saunders et al., 2012; Rowley, 2012). The interviews were not fixed to
these questions and were asked to elaborate on the topic to have a deeper understanding. The author
had follow up questions to get detailed information (Collis and Hussey, 2009). The reason to do a
semi- structured face-to face interview is that the author can capture the emotions and gestures of
the interviews more successfully and will help the author to easily adapt and respond to the given
answers. The other interviews were selected based on the snowball sampling, where the first
interviewee selects the future interviewees from their circle. The main intention was to cover a
wider range of interviewees at different levels within the organization to have a broader
understanding of the research topic. This included not only reinforcement of similar opinions, but
also identification of contradictions between the roles.
Drawing from the above discussion, semi-structured interviews seem to be apt for this study as the
aim of the study is to understand agile project success from the perspective of agile practitioners.
The flexibility of the interview helped the author to understand deeper about the topic and provided
greater insight to research question posed.
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3.6.2 Secondary data
Secondary data refers to internal publications and publicly available documents (Wahyuni, 2010).
The secondary data are of different types such as survey-based information collected by the
company as well as documentary data. The documentary data are written reports, recorded audio,
stakeholder reports and notices (Saunders, Lewis, & Thornhill, 2012). To collect secondary data,
the interviewees were asked to bring their project reports of completed projects or currently
working projects to discuss in detail about the success of agile projects in real time context. But
due to confidentiality reasons the interviewees were not able to bring any reports. So only the
primary data was used for this study and the primary data from the interviewees were cross-checked
with the findings from the literature.
3.7 Sampling method
The study results always depend on interviewees; hence it was more important for the author to
select interviewees who are an expert in this field and has good knowledge about agile
methodologies. To select the right interviewees sampling method was used (Rowley, 2012). Under
sampling a purposive sampling was done since it is useful for a qualitative research. Sunders et al.
(2012) points out that purposive sampling refers to intentional selection of specific interviewees so
that the researcher is able to fulfil the purpose and answer the research question. For the interview
study several people working at different levels within the company were chosen as samples. Since
all the interviewees differ in their job role a heterogeneous sampling method was used under
purposive sampling (Saunders et al., 2012).
The main motivation behind choosing HMS as a case company is that HMS uses both traditional
as well as agile methodologies depending upon the product that is developed. This means that there
are good grounds for establishing an understanding for both methodologies and identifying
similarities and differences that arise with product development process. The software development
at HMS is done using the scrum methodology which is an added advantage for conducting this
study and will help the researcher to achieve the purpose of the thesis.
3.8 Access to respondents
First the author mailed to the Group Manager and fixed a meeting with her to discuss about the
thesis and its purpose. After the discussion, a pilot interview was done and in the end the author
asked if access to other respondents was possible. And the next day, the author received a mail
from her with the name list of employees working at different levels within the organization. Then
the author started to initiate contact with the rest of the interviewees through mail and scheduled
interview with them. The questions for the interview was sent to the interviewees one day before
the interview, so they can be prepared beforehand. The duration of each interview was
approximately between 30 min to 1hr depending upon the interviewees work schedule.
3.9 Empirical Data
For the thesis, the research data will be collected in the form of primary and secondary data.
Primary data is the collection of new data that will be gathered through face-to-face interview as it
will provide the author with in-depth answer and will provide insight into the research problem
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studied. The secondary data will be documentary i.e. publicly available data or internal
publications. Telephone interview can also be an option if the interviewees feel more ease with it.
Details Interview1 Interview 2
Date
23.02.2018 7.03.2018
Duration
54 min 1hr 12 min
Place
HMS conference room HMS conference room
Interview type
Semi-structured face-to-face Semi-structured Face-to-face
Interviewee name
AG BO
Job role Agile developer Group manager and software developer
Experience
2 ½ years 10 years
Details Interview3 Interview 4
Date
22.03.2018 5.04.2018
Duration
52 min 1hr 12 min
Place
HMS Fika area HMS conference room
Interview type
Semi-structured face-to-face Semi-structured Face-to-face
Interviewee name
BE AC
Job role Group manager team lead Project manager
Experience
7 years 20 years
Table 3 Interview details
3.10 Questionnaire Design
The questions for the interview were carefully designed after analyzing the literatures used. The
interview questions were aimed to answer the research question of the thesis which is to understand
how the agile project success is perceived by the agile practitioners and what success criteria is
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considered important for the success of an agile project. The questionnaire had the following list
of sections.
Section1: Questions regarding general information about the respondent
Section2: Questions regarding the interviewees experience of working with both the project
management methods.
Section 3: Questions regarding success criteria of agile projects
The section 1 has general questions to understand the interviewees background, years of
experience, current job role within the company etc. to know more about the interviewee. The next
set of questions were framed in such a way to know whether the interviewee had experience of
working in traditional and agile projects. Then some follow up questions were added to gain
information about what king of methodologies were used for the respective projects and why those
methods were used. This will provide much more detailed information about each method and the
motive behind using those methods. The last section consists of question about project success to
understand the perception of the interviewees about the topic. This section has some important
questions that needs a longer discussion with the interviewees because the answers to these
questions are more important for the research question of this study. The interviewees were asked
to state the important success criteria that they use to evaluate a project and were asked to explain
the criteria further. The answers from the in-depth discussion with the interviewees about the
project success criteria provided answers to the research question posed in this study.
Interview guide
The interview guide had a list of questions that were developed prior to the interview. All the
interviews had more or less the same set of questions to make sure that the author does not steer
far from the planned path. According to Bryman and Bell (2011) an interview guide has to be
formed with sufficient amount of questions that would provide answers to the research question in
this study. Following the interview guide will help the author to run the interview smoothly.
Section 1
Questions about general information of the interviewees
1. Tell about yourself (including name, experience, job role within the company).
Section 2
Questions regarding the interviewees experience of working with both the project management
methods.
1. What agile methodologies are you using now? And why?
2. Have you worked with traditional methods before?
3. What major difference did you notice between the two methods?
Section 3
Questions regarding success criteria of agile projects
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1. How do you consider a success of an agile project?
2. What do you consider to be a successful project?
3. How success is measured in traditional and agile projects?
4. How do you prioritize between cost, schedule scope in traditional projects?
5. How do you prioritize between value, quality and constraints in agile projects?
6. Which success criteria (new) do you consider important for a project to be successful?
4. QUALITY OF THE REPORT
4.1 Reliability
The reliability of the study depends on the findings from the study. Reliability shows the extent to
which a study or research can be repeated without any differences (Collis & Hussey, 2009). Since
the results of the study depends upon the personal opinions and experiences of the interviews the
author believes that the reliability of the study can be a little lower due to the fact that it is qualitative
in nature compared to quantitative studies (Collis & Hussey, 2009). But the reliability is still
maintained by interviewing people from different levels within the organization to have a broader
insight to the research problem.
4.2 Validity
The validity of the study is higher since a qualitative study is aimed at providing high validity
through detailed and descriptive data (Collis & Hussey, 2009). The external validity otherwise
called as generalizability can be done to an extent since the author has interviewed people who
work at different levels within the organization for e.g. Project managers, team managers,
developers who have different job role and work in different projects under the same company. But
the study results cannot be generalized to a higher level unless there are greater number of
interviews conducted. The findings can be generalized to all IoT technology industries within
Sweden.
5. DATA ANALYSIS
Interview 1
Developer AG works as a front-end developer and manages cloud solutions and designs websites
for HMS. She works in a self-organizing team and also takes the role of a rotating scrum master.
Currently working on a project called Argos which is a cloud solution and a never-ending project
since they have to maintain the website all the time.
She has no experience of working in the traditional method but has experience only in scrum.
According to the respondent, the agile team is not aware and not given any information about
whether the project has succeeded or not. But this information is only known by the project
managers. Moreover, the respondent had no knowledge about the traditional iron triangle since she
had never worked with any traditional projects.
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Project success
Their perception about project success is a lot of quality in the product and also cost and the time
is least prioritized. But it differs with customized products for specific customers. But since they
work mostly on their own products, timing can be flexible. She also argues that benefits to the
customer is also an important criterion for the success of the project.
Project success criteria
The interviewee clarified that even though traditional projects strive to deliver benefits to the
customer, the agile mind-set is to deliver benefits to the customer as soon as possible. She said that
it is better to deliver the product in small chunks frequently rather than delivering the whole product
at once. And this will help them to receive quick feedback from the customer and make changes to
the product before the next sprint. One of the cornerstones of the agile mind-set that appeal to the
interviewee is the focus on quality. Flexibility is also an important aspect of working with agile
projects, and something that goes hand in hand with quality. The interviewee stated that APM is
vital as it understands change and welcomes it. The agile triangle is more suitable for smaller
projects that has clear requirements beforehand. But for longer projects, it is difficult to have clear
estimates before the beginning of the projects, and hence the constraints may change.
Agile triangle
The interviewee is asked to look at the Agile Triangle, and explain thoughts and feelings
surrounding it. Her one concern is the difficulties involved in measuring quality and explained that
quality is something that may differ depending on culture. As earlier explained, Interviewee 1
perceives quality to be a prerequisite when working within an agile project as the focus is very
much on quality.
“You cannot do quick releases if you don’t work with a quality mind-set, it is
all connected so intensely to the way you work when working agilely”
Interview 2
The second interviewee BO is a team manager and developer and works in business unit called
Anybus. They manufacture network interface card and gateway solutions to translate between
different protocols. The team works with common industrial protocols (CIP) and has seven
software engineers and testers. The team uses scrum as a process. The interviewee has experience
of working with the traditional and agile method. The biggest change he noticed between the
traditional and agile projects is that in traditional method the developers and testers were working
in different teams. So the development cycle was too long and after that the product was given to
the testing team. But after adopting agile, the developers and the testers work together in the same
team and hence developing, and testing is done simultaneously.
The interviewee also explained the difficulties and challenges they face when working in agile
projects. They still face some problems with the project managers since the project managers fear
about losing their power and control over the teams. Some project managers still have that
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traditional mindset which prevents them from completely adopting agile. The following challenge
was explained as below:
“But after changing to agile, the scrum master took over the responsibility and
project managers lost their influence and till today not found a good interface
between project managers and scrum teams. They are working much more in a
waterfall thinking and have problems in understanding what is good about
agile”.
Project success
When asked about the success of a project the interviewee explained that success to him is if you
have completed the project and reached what was agreed upon. The agreement is often set
beforehand and usually consist of time, cost, and whom should be a part of the project. A project
is successful if all parties still are in agreement after the project is completed, and if all requirements
have been met.
Agile project teams deliver an end-product to the client before it is finished so that they are able to
test it themselves and provide the team with valuable feedback. This is something that he finds
vital for APM. According to him output of the project is more important and it is measured in terms
of constraints. Communication with all the stakeholders is also important to make sure that
everyone knows the short-term and long-term goals. When asked about the differences between
APM and TPM in regard to success and how one evaluates it, the interviewee replied that in agile,
the teams are able to celebrate the success, since the results are more visible throughout the projects
in APM.
Project success criteria
The interviewee explained that constraints, to him, are the standard ingredients of a project. The
interviewee specified, explaining that the project plan contains a delivery time and a cost for the
entire project based on the scope given by the client. He further elaborated and explained that they
always try to establish which of the three is of highest priority by the client, building the focus of
the project. The interviewee stated that quality is something that permeates APM.
Agile triangle
The interviewee 2 explained that value and quality are important dimensions of iron triangle and
believes that these 2 dimensions exist within scope. She also stated that if the focus is to cut costs,
then it leads to greater costs in the future. Hence highlighted the alternative methods of thinking
which is to focus on value and benefits in order to earn more money.
Interview 3
The third interviewee BE having 7years experience of working in traditional and agile
methodologies. Currently, he works as a group manager for Netbiter wireless team. His
responsibility is to bring the product idea to the market Scrum is being used in their product
development process. The main objective behind using scrum is to break down the scope of the
product into smaller parts that can be executed in the near future. The main benefits of working in
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a scrum process as reported by the interviewee is that: short meetings, close collaboration and co-
operation within the team.
His opinion about working in agile is that it doesn’t solve everything. Especially in the case of
hardware development, it is much more difficult to work with because of longer turn-around times
for development and have to plan the development in more cooperation with other departments in
the line organization. Whereas in software development small features are added to a running
software and frequently released to the customer. In platform development when development
takes place from scratch, it is better to combine scrum with other methods like waterfall. It will
help the team to have better prediction of when the product can be delivered to the customer. Agile
can be followed completely in some sections of product development.
Project success
when a new product is developed, it is important to decide what is the highest priority to make it
successful. Customer value is the main thing. The company can create customer value by providing
cost effective solution for their problems. If the value is delivered too late or too expensive then
it’s a failure. So, it is important to know what is most important for the customer. He also said that
quality is within scope and not a separate element. It is important to understand whether it’s scope
or the solution within specific time limit or is it the cost for the solution. Important features have
to be prioritized first by the product manager and based on that the product owner can make priority
of the work for the team where the team makes sprint planning where they add the prioritized items
to the sprint.
To him, a successful project is simply a project that delivers the benefits the customer wants. He
further explained that this benefit does not need to entail everything that was stated prior to the
start of the project, emphasizing the importance of adjusting to change. Another thing that he
believes is important is that you have delivered the project that benefits the customer in a
sustainable manner. The interviewee does not feel the need to differentiate how one measures agile
project success in regard to traditional projects, as both project methods have goals and therefore
both methods could be measured by using the same success criteria. Another aspect that the
interviewee feels too little focus has been put on is the project team. It is important that all
employees feel good after a project, and that all employees still wish to work within a project team.
Project success criteria
When asked about the traditional success criteria, he does not find schedule as something crucial.
Costs however may be crucial. For him it is far more important to discover if the project is on the
right track or not, than the constraints. The interviewee argued that if the Return on Investment is
not enough, then he wishes the project to be eliminated altogether instead of continued. When asked
about the value, such as the customer benefit, the interviewee explained, Customer benefits may
vary much more, and Costs, according to him, are bound to fluctuate under the duration of the
project. Interviewee 3 therefore argues that the focus that all project managers and organizations
should have is to extract as much benefits as possible within the cost constraints. The interviewee
further explained that one of the largest benefits of an agile way of working is that everything that
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is done, is done with quality in mind. Compared to traditional projects, where it is easy to cut
corners and build with lower quality.
The interviewee explained that he also finds business benefits of high importance, and something
that he wishes that organizations focused more upon. He finds it extremely important that the
organization communicates the objectives of projects, so that the team truly knows the
organizational benefits of the projects that they do. The interviewee believes that this will
strengthen the morale of the team and enable better quality projects, as people know what to strive
for and why.
Agile triangle
The interviewee 3 believes that quality is within scope and cannot be considered as an important
dimension. Moreover, it is important to prioritize among the constraints to suit the customer needs.
The interviewee understands the different dimensions, and argues for its importance within agile
projects, as quality is something that cannot be renegotiated, and explains the connection that it
would have to value.
Interview 4
The fourth interviewee AC is the most experienced project manager and has worked with both
traditional and agile projects for more than 20 years. The interviewee has occasionally worked as
a test manager and project manager within the organization. During the last five years the
interviewee has mostly worked on IoT projects using APM methodologies. He explained how work
normally is executed in shorter sprints in order to continuously set and develop requirements. He
further explained how the initial specification requirements, which were very comprehensive from
the start, often changed throughout the project and that agile-like approaches ultimately were used.
However, the interviewee finished by highlighting that these are not similar to what we use today
as we now go into the agile methods fully aware. When asking the interviewee which methodology
he prefers to work with he explained that he prefers to work with agile methods for two reasons.
First of all, the reality in the type of projects that he works with is very complex and it is changing
very quickly, which makes it very difficult to work through traditional methods. Second of all, it
is often very difficult for a customer to understand in advance what an IoT system will looks like
when finalized. Therefore, agile methods make it easier for the customer since the product will be
developed and delivered bit by bit.
Project success
Concerning success, the interviewee was asked to discuss success in general terms. The interviewee
explained how personal success and project success differ, yet often go hand in hand. Personal
success refers to things in life that are both work-related and non-work-related, while project
success is connected to the project outcome. The things highlighted in regard to personal success
included personal development as well as accomplishments in regard to projects and other things
around him. When discussing project success, the interviewee explained how the primary criterion
is customer satisfaction. The interviewee also highlighted that the customer and the project
manager do not always agree on the extent to which the project is successful. He developed this
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argument by explaining how project success also can be referred to in terms of how well the
customer needs were met and how disagreements may occur when the customer does not realize
their own needs.
“I see that this is a very successful project, the customer maybe not as much,
but I realize that this is exactly what the customer needs”
In this sense, the project manager may be satisfied while the customer may not be satisfied to the
same extent. The opposite also is possible, as there are times when the customer may be satisfied
but the project manager is not as satisfied. This could happen if the project manager knows that
something could have been done differently and done better in order to be able to feel professional
pride, even though it is not required by the customer’s own order. In regard to, measuring project
success, interviewee number five discussed how organized measurement of project success does
not take place very often. The interviewee explained how there may sometimes be a survey sent
out to former clients in order to determine how satisfied they were with the project that had been
executed for them. In some projects, where the product will be used by many end-users, it may also
be necessary to conduct tests with these end-users throughout the development stages. This is done
to make sure that the product serves it purpose. Further, he explained that there is often a final
project evaluation where you compile everything that went well and everything that went bad in
an organized manner.
“You continuously get feedback on things that work well”
The interviewee explained how this feedback is one of the strengths of using APM methods,
especially since the projects often extends a two-year period. Further, the interviewee explained
how this is the main difference concerning evaluation of project success between the different
methodologies since the criteria used should be the same.
Project Success Criteria
In terms of constraints, the interviewee discussed how organizations have a budget and a timeframe
for the project as well as details on what to achieve through the project. He highlighted that these
specifics have been decided upon and it is necessary to stay within these boundaries when
conducting the project. However, the interviewee discussed that the agile journey may be
somewhat different to that of a traditional project since the content within these boundaries are
more flexible.
“Customer satisfaction is the primary [criterion] and it is naturally dependent
on schedule, cost, and scope”
The interviewee explained how customer satisfaction is dependent on schedule, cost, and the scope
of the project since this will affect the extent to which the customer is satisfied. User satisfaction
is also very important and should be considered a project success criterion since the product needs
to satisfy the needs of the user. The fifth interviewee also discussed that customer retention is an
important criterion for him as satisfied customers often return in the future, assuming that they have
the funding to do so. In terms of quality, Interviewee described it as a secondary goal. He explained
that quality is the result of an efficiency goal that has been accomplished through the project. For
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starters, the interviewee explained how the goals of the project often are divided in the project plan
to consist of both project goals and efficiency goals. These efficiency goals often relate to
organizational goals such as an improved financial monitoring, faster feedback on the economic
situation, or to cut a certain amount of services within the organization. The interviewee explained
how these efficiency goals often are related to improving internal processes by, for example,
achieving their monthly results in three days less.
“The functionality in the product that has led to that [efficiency goal] is more
secondary and that is what, in agile projects, you develop successively”
The interviewee considers the product functionality that leads to the achievement of these
efficiency goals to be secondary. He further explains how the functionality specifications can vary
a lot and that these variations do not matter as long as the desired efficiency goals are achieved. As
earlier discussed, when interviewee was asked to discuss project success in general terms, he
mentioned professional pride. The interviewee discussed how there are factors in a project that
make him, as a project manager, particularly satisfied and proud of. These may be factors that the
customer may not notice, such as the execution and the construction of the project. The interviewee
argued that it is sometimes difficult to achieve these personal criteria, as compromises may have
been necessary due to lack of time or money.
Agile triangle
The interviewee started by explaining that he describes the Iron Triangle in terms of schedule, cost,
and scope. The interviewee discussed how schedule and cost are factors that the customer has to
decide upon and that he, as a project manager, cannot decide or change for them.
“Costs and time, those are really up to the customer to determine what they
will look like”
These two constraints are very situational and have to be evaluated for each individual project. In
some cases, it may be possible to extend the time frame in order to obtain higher quality but
generally this is not the case. Therefore, the Interviewee does not completely agree with
Highsmith’s decision to put less focus on the cost and schedule of the project. The interviewee
understands and agrees with the reasoning behind the Agile Triangle yet argued that these
dimensions already is included in the Iron Triangle as scope refers to the two dimensions created
by Highsmith. The interviewee further discussed how the scope dimension, within the Iron
Triangle, also includes maintainability, adaptability, and maintenance cost in the long-term. He
discussed this further by explaining how the quality and value dimensions are interlinked and that
he incorporates aspects of both these dimensions into the scope dimension. The interviewee further
explained how it is important to develop a solution that takes the value and quality dimensions into
consideration, both in the short-term and in the long-term. It is important that the end product is
adaptable and maintainable, if not, the project is not successful.
6. FINDINGS and DISCUSSION
As visible in the research findings there are a several notions concerning project success that will
be further discussed. All projects, as discussed by the interviewees, are in some way constrained
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by predetermined schedules, cost and scope. As discussed by Kloppenborg et al. (2014) constraints
are the traditional way of evaluating project success. Out of 4 interviewees, interviewee 2
mentioned that a project is successful if it stays within the predetermined schedule, cost, and scope.
Interviewee 1 concluded in her interview that a project that delivers towards the original constraints
is a failed project, as you have not adapted to certain changes. This can be supported by Atkinson
(1999) who argues that the predetermined constraints, schedule, cost, and scope, are an outdated
perspective of project success. It is further supported by researchers claiming the need for a broader
definition of project success (Atkinson, 1999; Drury-Grogan, 2014).
The most evident theme found in regards to the success of the project was the project output. Most
of the interviewees agreed to that. Interviewee 1, 3, and 4 discussed the importance of the customer
benefit, and Interviewee 4 also mentioned that a project is successful if the customer is satisfied.
An aspect that researcher Cserháti & Szabó, (2014) has focused on is the happiness of the project
team, however this is not a mainstream focus when viewing success of a project. Interviewee 1
discussed the importance that all employees within the project team were happy and not
overworked at the end of a project. Interviewee 2 discussed the importance of joy and pride of the
project within the team.
According to Peterson (2007) motivation also has a strong connection to the quality of the end-
product, which is illustrative within the results chapter as a great focus within agile projects. This
is something that Interviewee 3 believes is important, as the team morale will be strengthened by
increased communication, which in turn will enable better quality projects.
As discussed by Schmid and Adams (2008) the project manager's role in motivating the team is
great, this further illustrates the appropriateness of the relationship between project management
success and team success; without a satisfied team and a successful team, project management
cannot be successful. In previous research, Schmid and Adams (2008) found that changes in scope
may cause demotivation within the team. But the project managers and team members say that the
nature of agile is to offer flexibility to changes and hence they are ready to welcome and embrace
change. Schmid and Adams (2008) also found that the absence of communication and support from
top management will cause demotivation, this may be even more important within an agile project.
This was reported by most of the interviewees since they lacked motivation and support from the
top management. But the interviewees feel that the process itself motivates them by offering them
flexibility in work.
Referring back to the purpose of this study, this thesis aimed to create a definition of agile project
success from agile practitioner’s perspective, as well as determining the success criteria they
consider important. As indicative from the discussion above, the main concern for agile
practitioner’s when evaluating agile project success is not the originally set schedule, cost, and
scope. The main concern is the output of the project, and team success. It was found that some
interviewees discussed sustainability. The project should be managed in a sustainable manner in
terms of the team, where the happiness of the team is of great importance. The project should also
benefit the organization in some way, such as increasing profits and improving processes, and shall
be beneficial for the client. For larger projects, the sustainability has to be maintained by responding
to change. Kerzner’s (2013) definition involved minimal scope changes. Change has been
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discussed by the interviewees as something inevitable, and one of the main advantages of the agile
mind-set is the positive attitude towards change.
Jugdev and Müller (2005) argue that project management success and product success cannot be
separated. The output of the project, which contributes to product success, was found to be of
importance to the project managers interviewed. Team success, contributing to project
management success, was also found important. Therefore, the findings of this research are more
inclined to agree with Jugdev and Müller (2005).
6.1 Project success criteria
Constraints
As mentioned above, The Iron Triangle is expressed in terms of scope, schedule, and cost. The
three dimensions of the Iron Triangle have been discussed by all of the interviewees. Many of the
interviewees do not support the Iron Triangle as neither an accurate nor complete criteria for
evaluating agile project success, as all interviewees discussed the necessity to consider criteria
additional to that of Constraints. This is in line with previous research findings, where Atkinson
(1999) argues that the Iron Triangle is a tried and failed criteria for measuring project success.
Interviewee 1 discussed how the Iron Triangle, in terms of adhering to the initially set Constraints,
is only appropriate as a success criterion if the project is no longer than three months. She further
discussed how it becomes difficult to plan longer projects in detail, and how rough estimates should
be made instead as anything may change. while Interviewee 3 discussed how costs are bound to
fluctuate throughout the project and that the focus therefore should be to extract as much benefits
as possible within the constraints. This was also apparent in the Theoretical Frame of Reference,
where Lee and Baby (2013) highlighted the need to maximize customer satisfaction in today’s
dynamic business environment.
On the contrary, Interviewee 2 considers Constraints to be important, as they have been agreed
upon with the customer, however he emphasized that the most important criterion is the project
output. Constraints are always influencing projects. hence it is important to highlight here, the
interviewees do not solely adhere to the iron triangle but also consider other success criteria when
it comes to agile triangle.
Value
Throughout the research findings, many success criteria that revolved around the customer were
found. Interviewee 4 discussed customer satisfaction to be a primary success criterion and
explained how it is naturally dependent on schedule, cost, and scope. Moreover interviewee 3
highlighted that a project is successful only if it has positive return on investment. These results
are supported by Highsmith (2009), who argues that the constraints of a project can be flexible as
long as value is delivered. When working with agile methods, the project team takes on the
responsibility of delivering Value (Cobb, 2011; Stare, 2013). This was discussed by a number of
the interviewees. Interviewee 1 considers customer benefits to be a lodestar in everything that they
do. Similarly, Interviewee 3 discussed how agile projects deliver the benefits you really want in a
world where changes occur rapidly. Agile projects also have a focus to deliver these benefits as
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soon as possible in order to be able to receive quick feedback. As discussed within the analysis of
project success, it has become apparent that the interviewees consider the output of the project to
be of importance.
Quality
During the interviews it became apparent that Quality is a key ingredient when using APM methods
and that it is a very important success criterion. The interviewees discussed that the Quality of the
product is continuously considered and modified throughout the project in order to generate the
highest possible customer benefits. This is supported by Highsmith (2009) who argues that in order
to maintain Value throughout the life-cycle of a project, organizations need to focus on both Quality
and Value.
Interviewee 1 and Interviewee 3 discussed that there is an enormous focus on quality when using
agile methods and how this is one of the strengths in using APM methods. This is supported by
Nicholls et al. (2015) who argue that agile approaches boost quality. Interviewee 4 described
quality as a secondary goal as the quality is the result of an efficiency goal that has been
accomplished through the project.
During the interviews it also became apparent that Quality is an aspect that is considered in the
long run. interviewee 4 discussed the long-term aspects of the product which is the quality. This
discussion is in line with Highsmith (2009) who argues that reliability refers to if the software
operates properly, and adaptability refers to if the software will be able to deliver value both today
and tomorrow. This illustrates that the Quality criteria of agile project success should include both
short-term and long-term aspects.
Business benefits
Within this study, the interviewees discussed the importance of including Business Benefits as a
success criterion. Interviewee 1 argued that the organization should present the benefits received
from the projects. Interviewee 2 argued that the possibility of increased profits or improved internal
processes needs to exist for a project to be launched. This reasoning is supported by Shenhar et al.
(2002) who argues that business success, through for example profit and increased market share,
has a direct impact on the company. Interviewee 3 further discussed this, explaining that Business
Benefits are of high importance, and something that is of little focus today. Interviewee 3 believes
that the quality will increase as people have a greater knowledge of what they strive for, and the
morale of the team will improve. This illustrates why business benefits have been considered as a
foundation to why a project has been initiated and also is included in the goals that are to be
achieved throughout the project. Hence a new dimension has been discovered in this study as it is
emphasized by most of the respondents within this study. This dimension has not been included by
Highsmith in the Agile Triangle, which illustrates the insufficiency of using the Agile Triangle as
a tool when evaluating agile project success.
Team success
Team success is discussed by interviewees in terms of the well-being and performance of the
project team and most of them argued for its inclusion as a success criterion. Interviewee 3 believes
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that it is extremely important to be sustainable in regards to your employees and that too little focus
has been put on the project team. Interviewee 1 also argued that it is important for a sustainable
work culture, claiming that it is very much related to the agile mind-set. This is something that
Interviewee 2 agrees with, claiming that agile project creates a happier workforce. Continuing,
Interviewee 2 argued that it is important that the team feels proud and happy after project
completion.
It is arguable that personal and professional development includes aspects of Team Success, as it
affects the team members’ motivation and their ability to perform and contribute throughout the
project. However, one may argue that the team aspects need to be highlighted and that this could
be done by separating Team Success from the Business Benefits criteria.
From the previous research it can be said that only few studies considered team success as an
important criterion for project success. In 1998, Wateridge conducted a study on success criteria
and found that project managers do not consider team happiness to be an important success
criterion. Within that study, the participating project managers ranked it as the least important
success criterion to consider, and team happiness was therefore not included as a major criterion
necessary for evaluating project success. But Hoegl and Gemuenden (2001) found that good
teamwork is necessary for the project to be successful. Müller and Turner (2007) found that team
satisfaction impacts overall success and customer satisfaction. They argued the importance of both
team and end-user satisfaction as a success criterion. But from the project manager perspective, the
team success is less considered as a success factor. This shows that there is a split view of team
success as a success criterion, but within this research the agile practitioners like developers, group
managers considered team success as an important success factor.
Flexibility
Another theme that emerged within this research is that of flexibility. During the interviews it
became apparent that flexibility can be seen as a key attribute of APM. Within agile projects,
Highsmith (2009) argues that the focus is on value and not on the constraints. Highsmith (2009)
instead argues that one should have a flexible approach to constraints in order to maximize the
value of the end-product. All interviewees discussed aspects of flexibility and how flexibility is
important throughout the agile project process. Flexibility aspects have been widely described and
discussed in terms of the characteristics and advantages of using APM methodologies (Drury-
Grogan, 2014).
Interviewee 1 explained how the agile mind-set emphasizes the need to recognize environmental
changes, requiring the project to adapt, and to implement necessary changes accordingly. Similarly,
Interviewee 4 discussed how flexibility is required in order to respond to the fast-changing
environment and how the flexibility is what differentiates the agile journey from the traditional.
This can be connected to the value of the end-product, as Nicholls et al. (2015) claim that the end-
product can be improved massively by implementing appropriate scope changes and finding value
increasing opportunities. Interviewee 3 also argued that it is far more important to discover if the
project is on the right track, instead of adhering to the constraints. This is supported by Nicholls et
al. (2015) who discuss how the value of the end-product can be improved by constantly looking
for value increasing opportunities and implementing scope changes. Therefore, even though
Balajikarthik K.C. Thesis in Industrial Management (IN8017)
42
flexibility may not be a success criterion in itself, it is evident that flexibility affects all other
success criteria found within this research and is a crucial component of the agile mind-set.
To conclude, within this research it was found that the agile project success criteria considered
important by Swedish agile practitioners within technology industry such as IoT are Constraints,
Value, Quality, Business Benefits, and Team Success. It was also found that Flexibility, even
though it should not be included as a success criterion itself, still is a crucial component when using
APM methodologies, as it affects all important criteria found.
Agile triangle
Interviewee 2 liked that Value and Quality, two aspects which he believes already exist within
“scope” of the Iron Triangle, are highlighted within the Agile Triangle. Interviewee 4 argued that
Value and Quality are of high importance. Interviewee 2 argued that the Agile Triangle and the
Iron Triangle incorporated the same features, but that the Agile Triangle went more into depth on
the attributes of the scope dimension. Another aspect highlighted by the interviewees is that it may
be beneficial to separate schedule and cost from scope as most interviewees discussed the critical
constraints of a project in terms of cost and schedule. Interviewee 2 discussed time to be the
constraint of primary concern, while Interviewee 3 considered cost to be the most critical
constraint. When discussing constraints, Interviewee 4 explained how it is necessary to stay within
the predetermined schedule and cost, as they have been agreed upon with the customer.
6.2 Conceptual Agile Project Success Criteria Model
The model presented below, represents the most important elements of agile project success criteria
as explained by the interviewees. This model differs from the agile triangle in terms of business
benefits and team success which are included as new elements in this model. As discussed
previously Value, the success criterion found most important within this study, constitutes both
customer benefits and customer satisfaction and is directly related to the output of the project.
Quality is an integral part of the agile mind-set and is therefore also an important agile project
success criterion. Team success is also considered as a success factor by the practitioners which
has not been emphasized in the previous research. Business benefits is considered as a prerequisite
for a project to be implemented and is therefore included as a success criterion. The constraints
including schedule, cost has also been included in this model, since all the projects are affected by
constraints.
The scope that was included in the previous models has been excluded from this model since most
of the interviewees argued that scope keeps changing throughout the project and hence it is unfair
to evaluate a project’s success based on a criterion that is known to change. The connection between
each of these criteria indicate that each criterion affects the other in one way or the other.
Thus, the most important access criterion considered by agile practitioners especially in an IoT
technology industry are found to be: Value, Team success, Quality, Business Benefits and
Constraints. Value was found to be the most important agile project success criteria and it
constitutes the backbone of APM. Value was also found to be the most important success criterion
by most of the interviewees, since it is directly related to the output of the project. Some of the
Balajikarthik K.C. Thesis in Industrial Management (IN8017)
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interviewees stressed the importance of customer satisfaction which is also considered as a value.
This stresses the importance of understanding the needs of the customer. It can be concluded that
Value as a success criterion is of high importance, since generating value is a component of agile
project success definition created within this research. Team success is another vital criterion
emerged within this research. It is not an entirely new concept, but it has been given less importance
in the previous project management research. Team success in the figure 10 denotes the happiness
of the team members, pride and joy of the end-result, and great teamwork.
Figure 12 Conceptual Agile Project Success Criteria Model
According to the findings from this research, Quality is also considered as an important success
criterion by the interviewees when evaluating the success of an agile project. Quality is a key
ingredient that enables the team to generate highest possible customer benefits in the long-term.
Business benefits on the other hand is one of the important prerequisite for projects to be
implemented and nowadays it is often included in the project goals. Within this thesis, it was found
that business benefits is often not communicated properly to the team. The interviewees therefore
argued that there is a large risk of failure in regard to both project goals, as well as other success
criteria such as Quality and Team success.
Therefore, the author concludes that communicating the Business Benefits to all stakeholders are
of high importance and should be a priority. The research findings also indicate that constraints is
a determinant of project success, because they are always considered in a project and can be tied
to project output, highlighting the necessity to include it as a criterion while evaluating agile project
success. Flexibility has been discussed as an integral part of the agile mind-set by all the
interviewees, and is particularly notable in terms of constraints, as they should be adjusted to
generate maximum value.
AGILE PROJECT SUCCESS CRITERIA
VALUE
QUALITY
TEAM SUCCESSCONSTRAINTS
(time, cost)
BUSINESS BENEFITS
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Thus, from answering the research question through the conceptual framework, this research has
filled the theoretical knowledge gap found in regards to defining and evaluating agile project
success by creating a definition with the help of conceptual model that defines agile project success
criteria from practitioner perspective.
7. CONCLUSION
Based on the initial literature review and the Research Framework developed, an empirical study
was performed in order to fulfil the purpose and to answer the research questions of this study. By
interviewing agile practitioners in the IoT field, the author has been able to gain insights into how
they view success of an agile project and what success criteria they consider important. The
research findings have enabled the author to answer both research questions and to fulfil the
purpose of this study. The purpose of this thesis is to create a definition of agile project success
from a agile practitioner perspective, as well as determining the success criteria they consider
important. This thesis also aimed to generate an understanding of agile practitioners’ perception of
the Agile Triangle as a success criterion. The research questions of the thesis will be answered
below.
1. How do agile practitioners in the IoT industry perceive the success of an agile project?
2. What success criteria is considered important for an agile project to be successful in the IoT
field?
As discussed in the analysis of project success, the success definitions stated in the Theoretical
Frame of Reference are not applicable to agile projects. Based on the Findings the author has
created a new definition of agile project success which is in line with the purpose of this study.
Within this thesis it was found that a successful agile project is a project that generates value in a
sustainable manner. “A sustainable manner” also takes into consideration team success, as well as
the flexibility needed within an agile mind-set. Generating value both entails working with quality,
an important aspect of APM, as well as creating benefit for the customer. The agile project success
criteria found to be important by Swedish agile practitioners are: Value, Team Success, Quality,
Business Benefits, and Constraints.
By answering the research question, the author has filled the theoretical gap found in regards to
defining and evaluating agile project success. Therefore, the purpose of this study is fulfilled by
creating a definition of agile project success from a agile practitioner perspective, as well as
determining the success criteria they consider important.
7.1 Limitations
One of the limitations of this study was that many of the projects that the interviewees worked on
where confidential, which limits the accessibility to the documentary secondary data throughout
the research. Hence the ability to cross-check the findings remains low. Moreover, the author has
access only to few interviewees which is also considered as one of the limitation within this study.
Balajikarthik K.C. Thesis in Industrial Management (IN8017)
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7.2 Implications for future research
In this research, the author has interviewed only agile practitioners, but it would be interesting to
study the agile practitioner perspective from different countries and compare those findings. This
research was conducted by interviewing participants from the IoT industry. Hence Conducting
research on different industries would therefore also be a possibility. One could also do a
quantitative study, to study which criteria is considered most important for the success of the
project.
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APPENDIX
Manifesto of Agile software development is followed by twelve basic principles. The principles
behind Agile software development manifesto are as follows (Agile Manifesto, 2001)
a. “Our highest priority is to satisfy the customer through early and continuous delivery of valuable
software.
b. Welcome changing requirements, even late in development. Agile processes harness change for
the customer's competitive advantage.
c. Deliver working software frequently, from a couple of weeks to a couple of months, with a
preference to the shorter timescale.
d. Business people and developers must work together daily throughout the project.
e. Build projects around motivated individuals. Give them the environment and support they need
and trust them to get the job done.
f. The most efficient and effective method of conveying information to and within a development
team is face-to-face conversation.
g. Working software is the primary measure of progress.
h. Agile processes promote sustainable development. The sponsors, developers, and users should
be able to maintain a constant pace indefinitely.
i. Continuous attention to technical excellence and good design enhances agility.
j. Simplicity--the art of maximizing the amount of work not done-is essential.
k. The best architectures, requirements, and designs emerge from self-organizing teams.
l. At regular intervals, the team reflects on how to become more effective, then tunes and adjusts
its behavior accordingly.”
KANBAN
Among many lean techniques, KANBAN is one of the major ones developed for pull system, where
products/ services are pulled into the production system by responding to customer’s demand
(Anderson, 2010). ‘KANBAN’ literally means ‘sign board’, ‘visual card’, ‘signal’ or ‘sign’. Each
Kanban card represents a piece of work and is moved throughout the production system. In this
paper, we will use ‘KANBAN’ (with capital letters) to describe the whole system and, ‘Kanban’
(e.g. ‘Kanban’ cards and ‘Kanban’ board for signal cards and a board respectively) (with lower
letters) to illustrate the workflow in KANBAN system. Kanban cards in a pull system are used as
a visualized management tool to communicate order details (e.g. What to produce? When? What
about quantity? How should it be delivered?) received from customers (Kniberg, 2011). When
using KANBAN, a Work-In-Progress (hereafter; WIP) is a common terminology for an existed
Balajikarthik K.C. Thesis in Industrial Management (IN8017)
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task in a workflow. Each WIP is shown with a kanban card in KANBAN and used to visualize the
workload distribution or bottlenecks exist in the workflow.
Anderson (2010) identifies five elements found in successful implementations of KANBAN: 1)
workflow visualization, 2) a limited number of WIP in the production system, 3) process
observation and workflow management, 4) explicit policy in the production system, and 5) usage
of models to identify opportunities for further improvements. Additionally, KANBAN allows users
modify the system depending on their needs and situations, thus serves well by offering solutions
to each unique problem existing in organizations. (Anderson, 2010).
Figure 5. A standard Kanban board (inspired by Anderson, 2010; and Kniberg, 2011)
As WIPs move from left to right, they send different messages to people in the workflow system.
For instance, a Kanban card in ‘Done’ under ‘Analysis’ means it is ready for the developers to
work on it. Once a developer starts to tackle on the task, the card is moved to ‘In Progress’ under
‘Development’. When the task is done in the subset of required work, it is moved to right column
and eventually the work is reach to completion. As no organization is the same but unique, subsets
of work (i.e. ‘Backlog’, ‘Analysis’, ‘Development’, ‘Test’, and ‘Release’ required are different
depending on the business situation. Thus, defining tasks required for each company or each
business function is essential for successful KANBAN implementation. Current workflow
observation and analysis, and wastes removal are prerequisites for the task definition. (Anderson,
2010; Kniberg, 2011)
LEAN
Since the success of Lean concept in Toyota Production System which made Toyota produce high-
quality cars with the lowest cost and shortest time, principles of Lean were then brought into other
areas including Software Development domain. In particular, the attention got significantly higher
after a book on Lean Software Development by Mary and Tom Poppendieck was published
(Poppendieck and Poppendieck, 2003). The key ideas behind Lean are to put all development
efforts on the value-adding activities from the customers‟ viewpoint and to analyze and identify
the waste in software process systematically and then remove it (Poppendieck and Poppendieck,
2003; Petersen, 2007). The seven principles of Lean are described in the following table
(Poppendieck, 2007; Petersen, 2010).
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Principle Description
Eliminate Waste Eliminate everything in software development process that does not
contribute to the value for the customer e.g. partially done work, extra
features, extra process, handovers (e.g. documentation), task switching,
delays, and defects
Build Quality In Software quality should be built in as early as possible and not late by
fixing the defects that testing found.
Amplify learning Processes and practices in companies should support learning. Learning
here includes getting a better understanding of customer needs, good
testing strategies, and so on.
Defer Commitment A commitment should be delayed as late as possible for irreversible
decisions. For instance, a complex architectural decision might require
some experimentation and therefore should not be committed early.
Deliver Fast Create short product development cycle time by minimizing the time from
receiving a request for a feature to the delivery of the feature
Respect People Poppendieck gave three principles that were used in the context of Toyota
case. First, entrepreneurial leadership, which means people that led by
managers who trust and respect them are more likely to become good
leaders themselves. Second, expert technical workforce, which means that
successful companies should make sure that the necessary expertise for
achieving a task is within the teams. Third, responsibility-based planning
and control, which means management should trust their teams and not
tell them how to get the job done. Moreover, it is important to provide the
teams with reasonable and realistic goals.
Optimize the Whole When improving the process of software development the whole value
stream needs to be considered end to end.
Table 2. Lean principles
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The author currently works as aproduction line executive at Svenssonwire and cable packaging AB. Theauthor is also the acting CEO at ILAIAB which produces earth-friendly,sustainable, biodegradable productsfrom fallen and harvested leaves.